Sunday, December 2, 2012

Killing Type-A Bad Habits

My Type A obsessive compulsive personality was inherited. Ask my father. It was an invaluable benefit to all my employers, but now that I’m retired, it defeats me at every turn. One of the great obstacles to relaxing on a trip is that it’s often difficult to meet the proposed schedule and planned objectives. Noon to 1400, arrive at next waypoint. 1400 to 1445, have fun. I know that’s not the way it’s supposed to be, but 60 years of indoctrination are hard to overcome. So, on this trip, even though I knew the weather, the drought, the Plains were all against me, if I couldn’t relax doing one thing, I’d try to fine fulfillment in something else---the local version of stopping to smell the dried-up sagebrush.

Drilling rig.

The first thing you’ll see driving across Oklahoma is the thousands of oil and gas wells and facilities. There are more wells than hairs on a dog. There’s not much of interest there, however, unless you’ve never seen a well before, but they’re everywhere, and you can’t go out for a drive without seeing new wells going in. One of the drilling companies were in the newspaper today lamenting that they only have 1,386 rigs in operation, and that’s just one company.

Pumping away with a slow chucka-chucka that sounds

like an old one-lunger fishing boat.

A rare treat is seeing an occasional herd of buffalo or bison. These are not naturally free-grazing bison, but commercial herds raised for meat. This herd is owned by the Comanche-Arapaho tribe. The tribal members told me about having problems with their buffalo being killed. Local brain-dead rednecks have been using the buffalo for rifle practice. There are also beefalo farms for cross-bred buffalo and cattle.

American Bison

I paced myself as I drove. I had checked the weather before leaving, and it looked great---warm temperatures and low wind. What I found on the road was far removed from light wind, and the conditions began to cast doubts about any paddling. Not only would it be rough on the water, but it was rough on the road, as the truck was buffeted about, and I had to keep 15-degrees of turn in the steering wheel to stay in my lane.